


Should Never

by Eloisa



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-05
Updated: 2012-06-05
Packaged: 2017-11-07 00:21:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/424817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eloisa/pseuds/Eloisa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Post-AFFC, at Riverrun, on the roof, in the rain.  Jaime reflects on a number of things he never should have done.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Should Never

**Author's Note:**

> Written before the release of A Dance with Dragons.

This wasn’t supposed to happen.

 Sleet slapped Riverrun’s battlements and puddles of freezing water swirled into the hot blood that streaked the parapet.  Jaime sucked air into his burning lungs and fought to concentrate on the steel in his hand.

 None of this should ever have happened.

 The outlaw before him feinted as if to a right-handed swordsman.  Jaime slapped the man’s blade aside and ran his own sword through the man’s helm-slit.  How many of them had flooded through that postern gate?

 How had Loras put it?  _‘Men who wear white breeches need to keep them tightly laced.’_   For a man who’d joined the Kingsguard out of love –

 No more of them in front of him.  He turned, wiping blood and rain out of his eyes.  Brienne faced the last outlaw across a fallen corpse, blade raised to meet his.

Brienne wasn’t beautiful, or elegant, or quick-witted.  Nothing a woman should be and plenty a woman should not.  But somehow, none of that had mattered, when they’d spoken, when they’d kissed.

 The shadows by the wall moved.  Another dark, mail-clad shape rushed at Brienne’s unprotected back with sword raised.  Jaime heard himself shout a warning as he dived forward to parry the blow.

 He’d kept his cock away from Cersei for a year after her marriage.  A year had seemed a lifetime, then.  He should never have gone back to her.  Hindsight was wonderful now, when a _minute_ in her company was eternity enough.

 He slipped and his momentum sent him tangling into the other man.  Jaime cursed as his sword spun from his frozen fingers; scant consolation that the brigand dropped his too.

After Cersei, celibacy should have been easy.

 Nothing was easy.

 He drove his knee into the outlaw’s groin.  The man doubled over.  His flailing arm caught Jaime round the side of his head.  He stumbled against the parapet and swayed half out into empty space.  The Tumblestone roared below him, waters foaming like a giant’s spittle.

 He should never have laid a hand on Brienne.  Should never have showered her in an adolescent’s pretty words.

 Brienne ran her blade through her opponent’s neck.  But she was turning too slowly.  The remaining outlaw was reaching for his fallen sword.

 He should have sent her away from Riverrun as soon as he’d welcomed her; on her search for Sansa, or back to her father.  He should never have let her stay.  Certainly should never have decided to inspect the battlements at the same time as she was taking the air.  Shouldn’t have met her; shouldn’t have stayed.

 Jaime grabbed the man’s dirty yellow cloak and yanked.  The brigand lost his footing and clattered backwards into him.  They skidded together again on the ice-slick parapet.  Jaime thrust out his golden hand to block his fall and met nothing beneath it.

 He should never have told her –

_The things I do for love_ , Jaime thought as the screaming water came up to meet him.


End file.
